Neglect and death of 800 kids in Galway happened in plain sight
Sheila Langan June 04,2014

The 796 infants and children buried in an unmarked mass grave in the septic tank behind St. Mary’s Mother and Baby home in Tuam, Co. Galway made headlines around the world after their shocking story broke last week.

But this is not the first time the Home and the ‘Home babies,’ as locals call them, have been in the news.

Following early reports on the research of Tuam historian Catherine Corless, who brought the story to light, Liam Hogan, a Limerick-based historian and librarian, began uncovering a trail of damning news clips dating from before the Home’s founding in 1925 to after its closure in 1961.

The articles show that the Home was very much a matter of both public and governmental knowledge. And the way in which they discuss the Home’s occupants (or “inmates” as they are more often referred to) makes clear the totally normalized disdain with which all the “illegitimate children” and “fallen women” were held.

The Tuam Children’s Home, it turns out, is a scandal that emerged from an even earlier scandal – The Glenamaddy Children’s Home, less than 20 miles away.

Bodies of 800 Babies Reportedly Found in Sewer Tank in Ireland
Thursday, Jun 5, 2014
New research suggests that some 796 children were secretly buried in the sewage tank of a home run by nuns in Tuam, Ireland, where unmarried pregnant women were sent to give birth in an attempt to preserve the country’s devout Catholic image, NBC News reported. People who lived near the home– run by nuns from the Bon Secours Sisters congregation between 1925 and 1961 — said they have known about the unmarked mass grave for decades, but a fresh investigation was sparked this week after research by a local historian purportedly showed that of the hundreds of children who died at the home, only one was buried at a cemetery. http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/national-international/261955901.html